Technology forum

[aero]

A technology forum for discussion of technology such as programming, software, hardware, networking, and such would be nice to have to broaden the scope of General Discussion a bit with something people are more likely to have an interest in. Thoughts?

[Thehelmetguy1]

I am up for it. A forum about technology could be quite useful to some users(including myself) and could also generate some solid discussion.

[Fuyu]

I personally dig it, but would people use it, though? No offense, but I feel most users aren't into SMBX or on the forums to discuss this particular topic. I find it to be completely unrelated to the main theme of this place.

[Cedur]

You can try to make this a thing but it's not surprising if it barely gets anymore posts after some months.

[aero]

There's already a niche in the community interested in programming and the forum wouldn't need to be too technical so potentially anyone could post there as long as it's technology related. The desktop thread, and the general programming threads come to mind for general cases for participation. It'd also be a good start to get people more into it with guides, help, and discussion about the things everyone uses to get here and interact with daily.

[WildW]

What would be done in said forum? General discussion on new/old softwares, electronics, etc? And if so; would we also be allowed to post about technological problems like malfunctions with our computers and ask for help on them? Also, do you think it would be good to have subforums about specific aspects of technology (Programming, help and support, and so on)? I am really interested in the idea however, technology as the title would technically be incorrect. Technology isn’t just electronics and softwares, it's human inventions. But at the same time, it really doesn’t matter about the name of the forum. Just the purpose and amount of use it encounters.

[Emral]

I don't think it would get enough traffic to justify its existence. The LunaLua subforum is capable of handling a good portion of programming interest in the community. If someone is looking for advice in other languages (or advice on technical problems) however, they're likely to google a more appropriate community or tutorials on other websites, as the response time would be much quicker.
If one wanted the LunaLua subforum to perhaps be a bit more exposed, it could be promoted to the same status as the Graphics forum. I think graphics, scripting (and music too but we have almost no musicians in the community) share a lot of similarities when it comes to usage in SMBX (it's a type of asset which can be requested and easily dropped in on a per-level basis to enhance a part of the product).
What could be done to allow sharing of non-smbx non-videogame programming is the inclusion of programming as a category of art on the art board, since that's already used for creative works and developing software suits that categorisation as well, in my opinion.

[aero]

I think those are really good ideas for a direction to go in. But I do still believe it would justify its existence enough because it's not just a programming forum and wouldn't have any sort of barrier to entry for discussion. Stuff like the net neutrality threads, or the desktop thread would go into the Technology forum and be separated from the rest of the Sandbox threads with no general theme to them.

[Emral]

What I'm unsure about is whether such a distincion is necessary. The sandbox forum serves as a grab-bag for topics that don't relate to any larger theme on the forums. While the creative aspect of using technology through software development is represented in the community, threads like Net Neutrality and the Desktop screenshot thread seem general enough to me to be grouped with other "themeless" threads in the sandbox. For the examples in question:
The desktop thread is hardly more than a forum game for postcount inflation from what I can tell. Sure it can be neat for some to see an unusual desktop setup under linux optimised for maximum productivity, but the thread generally boils down to wallpaper sharing, so I don't see much of a technological aspect to it other than the fact that it's about something on a computer.
The Net Neutrality thread (and by extension the Internet is Fine) thread are threads tackling current events in the world which happen to be about technology. While they're of more serious nature than many other threads in the Sandbox forum, I would group them (and the Programming, Depression, Homosexuality == choice?, etc... threads) more with what you would once find in the "Serious Discussion" forum on the older forums. If giving these kinds of topics a bigger spotlight is the goal, bringing back Serious Discussion sounds to me like an overall fairer solution to me than singling out technology-based topics.

[aero]

That's a valid point. Maybe something similar to the Serious Discussion forums would gather up those topics under a bigger spotlight, and the same could be done with the LunaLua subforum by making it a regular forum like you were saying.